Thursday, July 28, 2005

Fonts for Fiction: Does anybody else find that the font and layout of a book affects their feelings about it?

As in, when a book is written in big letters in a big hardcover book with lots of empty space on the page, it feels different in tone than a little paperback book where the words are packed in close, and there's not so much blank space?

I think for me, the denser the words on the page are, the "denser" the book feels. The wider spaced the words are, the "looser" the feeling I get from the book. I've had different impressions of the same book based simply on whether I read it in paperback or hardcover.

I know it's not just my imagination--obviously, the word "SUNSHINE!" would have a dramatically different feel if it were written in two-feet tall letters of dripping blood across a brick wall--but I wonder if it has the same effect on other people it has on me.

2 comments:

Rebecca said...

Yes, I would say I feel more relaxed when reading a book that has bigger fonts and more white space. I understand exactly what you mean by the "denser" feel.

Jeff Faria said...

I t h ink t h e a rrange m e n t of t y p e mak es a l l t h e differ e n c e i n t h e w o r l d . B u t h e y . t h a t ' s m


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